1. Field
The present application generally relates to browser-enabled devices, and, more particularly, to browser-enabled devices having browser-based user interface and control architectures with priority attributes.
2. Related Art
An ever increasing number of electronic devices (e.g., mobile phones, handhelds, home appliances, set top boxes, etc.) include browser software. In some of these browser-enabled devices, the user interface and control architecture is implemented using the browser software (i.e., a browser-based interface and control architecture) rather than a full-function operating system (O/S).
The user interface portion of the browser-based interface and control architecture can be written using a markup language (e.g., hypertext markup language (HTML), Javascript, etc.), which can be faster to write and more flexible than if written using C/C++, as an example. However, markup languages typically do not support prioritization of events.
For example, if a mobile phone has a browser-based interface and control architecture and the user interface portion is written using HTML, then the browser-based interface and control architecture may not be able to interrupt an event that is currently being performed (e.g., the downloading of a page) to perform an event with a higher priority (e.g., an incoming call). Thus, in this example, the user of the mobile phone may not be informed about the incoming call until the downloading of the page is completed. This may result in the incoming call going unanswered, which may be undesirable.
With regard to mobile phones that support both telephony and browsing functions, one conventional approach to allowing for an incoming call to halt the downloading of a page is to perform the telephony and browsing functions on separate threads (one thread for telephony functions and another thread for browsing functions). This (running multiple threads) requires the use of a full-function OS. It may be undesirable, however, to use a full-function OS in some circumstances. For example, it may be desirable for a browser-enabled device to use a less powerful processor and less memory than are typically required to support a full-function OS. Additionally, it may be desirable to run only a single thread because of simplified programming model.